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The Cadillac Black to Join Dierks Bentley on End of Summer College Tour
By: Alanna Conaway
Summer will round out nicely for the Cadillac Black, who have just signed on to open some shows for Dierks Bentley. Bentley’s Back to College Tour will have him — and TCB — hitting SEC campuses at the end of August.
The new dates mark the second time that the Cadillac Black has hit the road with Bentley, the first being the Country and Cold Cans Tour, which also had them opening for the Eli Young Band. The newcomers have taken several major stages in recent months, where they have been spotlighted as the opener for the likes of Eric Church, Lynyrd Skynyrd and ZZ Top.
TCB frontman, Jaren Johnston, has already spent plenty of brotherly bonding time with Dierks Bentley off the road, so they’re well acquainted. Recently, Johnston worked in the studio with Bentley, serving as producer of the ‘Home’ singer’s forthcoming EP, ‘Country & Cold Cans,’ which is set to hit shelves on Aug. 21.
“Dierks and his band have such a great vibe and play so well together,” Johnston says. “Dierks asked me if we could get some of that ‘dirt’ we put on our music and I said, ‘Well, hell yeah!’ I’m super stoked on how it turned out and I think country music fans are in for a treat. Y’all get ready for a party!”
The Cadillac Black are currently playing their own headlining shows nationwide in support of their self-titled debut album, available now at all digital retailers.
The Cadillac Black Tour Dates With Dierks Bentley:
8/20 — University of Georgia
8/21 — University of South Carolina
8/22 — the Grove at the University of Mississippi - Taste of Country
Discography
The Cadillac Black (2012)
Singles:
"Get Your Buzz On" (2012)
Photos
Bio
While The Cadillac Black might be a brand new band a little over a year old as of this writing native Nashvillians Jaren Johnston, Neil Mason and Kelby Ray have been friends and musical co-conspirators for as long as anyone can remember. They've weathered their wild teenage years and even wilder tours, weathered major label letdowns and major league triumphs, conquered Music Row Johnston co-wrote Keith Urban's #1 single You Gonna Fly and crashed on the couches of strangers in far flung cities. These boys have seen more ups and downs than a Smoky Mountain tour guide.
But in spite of all the trials and tribulations or perhaps because of them The Cadillac Black have emerged with a sound all of their own, a sound that hovers between radio-ready country anthems, hard-and-heavy rock and traditional Southern folk. You could call it country fuzz, you could call it hipster-billy, you could call it any number of over-hyphenated, adjective-strewn things but when you boil it all down there's only one way to describe it: damn good music, as pure and refreshing as a country creek.
It's a sound that works as well in front of an amphitheater full of ZZ Top fans or the Dierks Bentley crowd as well as it does in the dive bars and dark corners of the underground music. Though, truth be told, the Cadillac Black's sound probably works best blaring out of your car speakers as you fly down the highway, wind blowing through your hair on the way to another wild Saturday night.
Built around Masons thundering, melodic percussion and the sinewy intertwining of Johnston's guitar with Ray's lap steel, songs like I'm Southern, Days of Gold and Whiskey Soaked Redemption on their self-produced debut bristle with energy and explode at a moments notice. Tracks like Down to the River, Get Your Buzz On and Back It Up evoke the legends of Southern Rock your Molly Hatchets, your Outlaws, your Ozark Mountain Daredevils but they aren't nostalgic, aren't fetishistic reconstructions of by-gone eras. This the new sound of the New South, bigger and badder than ever.
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